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by lovetodanceandshout



Category: The Book of Mormon - Ambiguous Fandom, The Book of Mormon - Parker/Stone/Lopez
Genre: 12daysofBOM, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Friendship, Holidays, M/M, Marriage Proposal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:28:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28158306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovetodanceandshout/pseuds/lovetodanceandshout
Summary: As the room erupted into loud congratulations and Chris’ signature squeal, Naba made her choice.If Arnold wasn’t going to ask her to marry him, she'd just have to do it herself.
Relationships: Arnold Cunningham & Kevin Price, Arnold Cunningham/Nabulungi Hatimbi, Elder "Connor" McKinley/Kevin Price, Elder Church/Elder Thomas (Book of Mormon Musical), Elder Davis/Original Male Character, Nabulungi Hatimbi & Elder "Connor" McKinley
Comments: 1
Kudos: 11
Collections: 12 Days of Book of Mormon (2020)





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**Author's Note:**

> day five of 12daysofbom! have an arnaba fic that i've been working on for several months

Nabulungi Hatimbi was 28 years old when she made one of the most important decisions of her life. 

She had long since relocated her entire life to the United States, having acquired a student’s visa to study at NYU, and she and Arnold had been together for 9 blissful years. Arnold was patient, hilarious, and shockingly good with words. His zany personality perfectly balanced with Naba’s own enthusiastic and optimistic one. He was, by all accounts, Naba’s perfect boyfriend. 

And she was happy with that. Truly. So happy that when Chris and James announced their engagement and subsequently got married, she felt nothing but pure, unadulterated joy for her friends. And maybe she felt a twinge of jealousy when Kevin Price, the most emotionally illiterate person she knew, got his shit together enough to ask Connor to marry him, but she was mostly happy for her best friends. She watched as the world changed around her, with both of the other couples marrying and welcoming children (Connor and Kevin’s a son adopted from Poland, and Chris and James’ a daughter via surrogate) and becoming wholly domestic. And she was ashamed to admit it, but over time, she’d grown more and more jealous of her friends. She told herself that as long as she and Arnold were engaged before their group’s eternal bachelor, Jonah Davis, she would be fine.

Then, one particularly stormy day, when the group was all congregated at the McKinley-Price house, Jonah and his boyfriend of a year got the group’s attention and enthusiastically proclaimed the news that Naba had hoped not to hear.

“We’re engaged!”

And as the room erupted into loud congratulations and Chris’ signature squeal, Naba made her choice.

If Arnold wasn’t going to ask her to marry him, she'd just have to do it herself.

~*~

Now that the decision to propose had been made, Nabulungi just had to decide how to do it. For this, she enlisted the help of one of her best friends, Connor. She arrived at his and Kevin’s house out of the blue, knowing full well that Connor was alone with his son (Arnold and Kevin were together, of course). 

She knocked on the door and waited a few moments before the door swung open to reveal a surprised Connor.

“Hey!” he spoke in a voice that was somehow both exclamatory and quiet (as though he was trying to avoid waking a child), “uh, come on in. Theo is napping. Did I know you were coming over?”

Naba shook her head as she followed Connor into the kitchen, speaking in a hushed tone to match his. “No, I did not say anything about coming over because I don’t want Arnold and Kevin to know.”

Connor shot Naba a strange look as he poured two steaming mugs of coffee, adding vanilla and sugar to his own.

Moments later, Connor and Naba were sitting together on the couch, coffee in hands. Connor took a long sip of his drink as Naba explained the situation at hand, arching a perfectly groomed eyebrow when she finished.

“So, you want to propose to Arnold?” Connor nodded his approval before setting down his mug, “and you want me to help you plan it. I gotta be honest, Naba, I don’t exactly have the most experience with proposals. Mine and Kevin’s engagement wasn’t exactly well thought out.” By that, he meant that Kevin had tried to plan an extravagant proposal but had gotten excited and accidentally asked Connor a week sooner than he had planned to.

“Well, yes, but you’re the most organized person I know,” Naba insisted, giving Connor her best pleading expression, “I don’t have any other friends who have a scheduling chart for their five-year-old.”

“You also don’t have any other friends with five-year-olds,” Connor responded dryly before his expression softened, “but I know what you mean. So what’s the game plan? Do you have any ideas?”

Nabulungi shook her head, “I have no idea how I am going to do this,” she felt almost ashamed that she didn’t have more of a plan, “I just… want to marry him.”

“Okay,” Connor reached out and gave Naba’s hand a squeeze, “we’ll figure it out.”

After much discussion, a slightly heated debate, a solid hour of Naba trying to write a play to propose with, and a phone call to Chris, the two friends had still come up with zero ideas for the proposal. Connor was about to suggest that they ask Kevin when Naba’s eyes flitted to the entryway, where Connor had hung mistletoe.

“I know how I am going to propose.”

~*~

Three weeks later, the group was gathering in Chris and James’ house for their annual Christmas Eve celebration. Kevin, Connor, Jonah, and Daniel (Jonah’s partner) had already arrived when Arnold and Naba walked through the door.

Naba met Connor’s eye, and he winked at her before jerking his head towards the mistletoe he had hung from Chris and James’ ceiling. All part of her master plan. Okay, it was actually a very simple plan, but it was perfect.

“Look, Naba!” Arnold enthused loudly, catching the attention of everybody in the room. “Mistletoe!”

“I see it, Arnold,” Naba grinned, placing her hand on Arnold’s chest before he could kiss her. “Wait. Before you kiss me, I have something very important to ask you.”

“What is it?”

“Will you marry me?”

If life were a cartoon, Arnold’s head would have exploded. There was nothing extravagant about the proposal. None of Naba’s typical flair for the dramatics. But they were standing together, in a room full of friends who were more like family, and Naba couldn’t have thought of a better way to ask him.

“I love you. A lot, Arnold. You have given me so much and shown me how much potential I have. I did not choose to fall in love with a white boy from America, but I’m very glad that I did because you are my best friend. And I would like to have you be my husband.”

“Woah… Nabalungi, this is amazing!” Arnold laughed maniacally as Chris shook his head in the background (“Only took him nine years to learn to say his own girlfriend’s name.” “ _Christopher._ ”). 

“Yeah! Woah, yeah! Let’s get married!” Arnold leaned forward and kissed Naba enthusiastically before whirling around and sprinting towards his best friend at top speed, engulfing him in a hug.

“KEVIN! Naba and I are gonna marry each other!! Isn’t that just the most amazing thing?”

Kevin chuckled as he returned the hug, patting Arnold’s back. “I know, buddy. I’m happy for you.” Arnold’s attention had already been redirected before Kevin had even finished speaking. He crouched down to be level with the two children that were perched on the couch.

“Theodore! Vivienne! Your Auntie Naba is gonna _marry me_!”

“I don’t think the kids really understand what that entails, pal,” Jonah spoke up from his place across the room. He crossed to Naba and gave her a hug, “congrats, Hatimbi. You’ve successfully confirmed the first and only heterosexual marriage in this group.”

“Yeah, we’re a pretty gay group, huh?” Connor laughed, “it’s because Arnold and Naba are the only valid cishet people.”

“Amen to that.”

The group quickly launched into chaos, discussing plans for Arnold and Naba’s nuptials (as well as Jonah and Daniel’s) amongst themselves until James loudly gathered everyone’s attention.

“Hey guys, as much as I love all of this theoretical wedding planning, I spent all day making this food so you’d better come eat it.”

The whole group relocated to the kitchen, but the chatter didn’t cease, instead growing in volume as the topics shifted between wedding plans, holiday reminiscing, and talk of the other guys from their mission, the excited shouts of two young children filling in gaps in the conversation.

Yes, this was the _perfect_ way to propose.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!! i may or may not be a massive jason michael snow fan and therefore a massive jonah davis fan. also apparently jason's elders were marshall cross and jonah davis so that's neat!  
> once again, you can find all of my social media [here!](https://eldermckinley.carrd.co/)  
> 


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